Maxine

by SUE FINEMAN

  The beam under the outside bedroom wall was still holding. He prayed it held long enough to get her out of that death trap. If she was still alive.

  He ran up the hill on the left side of the cabin, fighting his way through the salal and huckleberry bushes. The house was completely off the foundation, but the beam felt solid. Crawling under the beam, he picked his way through the rubble toward the place he thought the woman had fallen, knowing one wrong move could bring it all down on top of him. He should have his head examined for doing this, but there wasn’t time to call for help. He had to get her out now.

  A few feet in, the woman lay face down, buried in debris and bedroom furniture. The low moan that came from her still body told him she was injured, but alive.

  The cabin creaked and settled above them, raining more plaster dust. Nick’s heart pounded. They had to get out of here, but he couldn’t move her until he knew how badly she was injured. “Can you hear me?”

  She moaned and answered, “Yes.”

  “Good. Can you move your hand?”

  She moved her left hand, the one nearest him.

  “What about the other one?”

  She moaned again, and he asked, “What hurts?”

  “Mostly my right shoulder. Am I going to die?”

  “Not if I can help it. Can you feel your toes?”

  “Yes, but it’s hard to breathe.”

  “That’s not a surprise. You have half the house on top of you.” He carefully moved a dresser and pushed pieces of the bedroom ceiling off her. A big board across her right shoulder held her down. He couldn’t move it and pull her out at the same time, and if he moved it much, neither one of them would get out alive.

  “My hair is caught.”

  He pushed at another beam and the structure above them began to move, spilling more insulation and plaster dust. He fought the urge to flee and save himself, but he couldn’t live with himself if he left her here to die.

  He went at it from a different direction, trying to pull her hair out, but it wouldn’t budge. “Damn. I can’t get your hair loose.”

  “Do you have a pocket knife?”

  “Yes.”

  “Cut it off. Please,” she begged. “Get me out of here.” She sounded terrified and he couldn’t blame her.

  “I’m doing my best,” he said gently.

  “I know,” she whispered. “I’m so scared.” Scared didn’t touch it. Cara was hurting and unable to see or move, and the cabin was folding in on her as if she were being closed in a coffin. A scream bubbled up inside her, but she held it in.

  His knife tugged at her hair, freeing her head. “Can you move your feet?”

  “Yes. My left leg feels wet.”

  “It’s probably blood. You have a cut on your leg. I’m going to lift the beam off your shoulder, and I want you to crawl out. Okay?”

  “Yes, okay.”

  The beam lifted slightly. “That’s as far as I can move it. Get out of there. Now.”

  Cara pushed with her toes, inching forward, the only direction she could go.

  “Hurry. I can’t hold this much longer.”

  The glass cut her hands and arm and sliced through her knee. Her shoulder hurt more with every breath, every move, but she kept going until she was free of the beam.

  The house shifted above her again, bringing more dust. With a grunt, the man slowly lowered the beam. Squeaks and groans came from above them, and Cara’s heart raced with fear.

  He grabbed her arm and guided her through a small opening under the side of the cabin. Her eyes burned with plaster dust, something sharp stung her knee, her head pounded, and the pain in her right shoulder snatched her breath away, but she was out of that make-shift coffin.

  The man helped her down to the beach, to a big rock. Still shaking, she sat on the rock. Her eyes burned and watered, but she had dirt and glass on her fingers, so she couldn’t wipe them out. “I can’t see.”

  “Yeah, I know. Hold on a minute.” He stood back and brushed off his clothes and hair and then pulled a clean handkerchief from his pocket. Lifting her chin, he gently wiped the corners of her eyes. “Better?”

  She blinked several times. “Much better. Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome. I’m Nick.” He spoke with a New York accent. “What’s your name?”

  He didn’t recognize her, and Cara couldn’t tell him who she was. “Max. Call me Max.”

  Nick ripped her pants over her left knee and pulled out a piece of glass. Blood spurted out and Cara looked away, sick to her stomach. She never could stand the sight of blood. He held his handkerchief over the cut until the bleeding stopped.

  Numb with shock and pain, Cara stared at what remained of the cabin she’d rented. There was nothing left but a pile of rubble. She thought she’d be safe in that little cabin until she ended her marriage. Now she wasn’t sure she’d ever feel safe again.

  Chapter Two

  Lance rode out the earthquake in Cara’s Jaguar. The radio station he’d been listening to went off the air, so he fiddled with the radio until another station came in. As he expected, the earthquake was the primary topic of discussion on the news. The epicenter was south of Seattle, off Vashon Island, and it was a big one. Many of the older buildings in Seattle were damaged, the facades cracked, and hundreds of people were injured in Seattle alone. Reporters were excitedly jabbering and interviewing people, saying the same things over and over again.

  Skirting the bricks and debris in the city streets, he drove home. Because the traffic lights were out, it took nearly an hour to go four miles. Aside from the alarm system blaring away and a few crooked pictures on the walls, the house was essentially undamaged. Not that it mattered. He didn’t own the damn house.

  Cara had wanted him to buy them a house after he got settled in his new job, so they could live like ‘regular people,’ but there was no job. If she’d had any sense at all, she would have known that. His wife had enough money to buy half the city and she wanted him to buy the house? Why should he work when he had a rich wife?

  <>

  Nick glanced at the woman as they stepped up to the side deck at his house. She looked like she was barely holding on. He opened the kitchen door and grabbed the phone to call 911. Dead. Now what? The roads were probably damaged, but she couldn’t walk up the hill to his car anyway.

  He’d clean her up, keep her warm, and try to make her comfortable. As soon as the phones came back on, he’d call for help and notify her family. Someone must be worried about her.

  Standing outside on the deck, Nick started at the top, with a hairbrush, working around the tender lump on her head. Tiny pieces of glass, plaster dust, and strands of insulation flew as he pulled the brush through her hair. He’d really butchered it. A few strands hung to her waist, but the rest was hacked off just above her shoulders, leaving a ragged, ugly mess.

  Nick tried not to think about what he was doing, undressing a strange woman, peeling her clothes off, cleaning her up as if she were a small child, but someone had to do it. She needed a doctor or another woman, not a clumsy guy like him.

  He had to use scissors to get her sweatshirt off, and he cut the rest of her hair while he had the scissors in his hand. “I’ll get my cousin down here to fix your hair in a day or two. He used to be a barber, cuts hair for everyone in the family now.”

  Her right shoulder was swollen and dark red. He hoped it wasn’t broken, but he wouldn’t be surprised if it was.

  “How does it look?” she asked.

  “Colorful,” he said gently. It must hurt like hell. He wondered what would happen when the shock wore off. “Come over here and lean on the rail.”

  He pulled her shoes off and unzipped her jeans, carefully easing them down to her ankles. She stepped out of them, her pale skin covered with goose bumps. It wasn’t that cold today, sixty-something, but she had to be freezing with nothing on but her underwear. At least it wasn’t raining.

  “Go inside and sit in the kitchen, Max. I’ll clea
n out those cuts and find us both some clean clothes.”

  She walked inside like a robot, glassy-eyed and obedient, while he pulled off his own shirt, shoes, and jeans. No sense tracking this glass into the house.

  He ducked into the bedroom and pulled on clean clothes and grabbed a pair of well-worn sweats for Max.

  Using water from his emergency supply, he washed the blood from her face and hands and arms, pulling out tiny pieces of broken glass with a pair of tweezers. She winced, but didn’t cry out until he moved her right arm.

  “Would you please unfasten my bra? The strap hurts my shoulder.”

  He unhooked her bra and gently pulled the strap off her right shoulder. He tried not to look, but he couldn’t help himself. Nice. Very nice. Injured or not, this woman was very well put together. Her nipples were pale rose. He was no expert, but he thought they’d be darker on a woman with black hair. Lisa had black hair and hers were much darker.

  Moving Max’s right arm as little as possible, he put his soft old sweatshirt on her.

  He washed around the cut on her knee and cleaned out the gash on her calf. She whimpered a little. Any other woman he’d ever known would have been crying her eyes out by this time. Using antibiotic ointment, he treated and bandaged the gashes, pulling the tape on her calf tight to hold it closed. She needed stitches in that one. He prayed it didn’t get infected before he could get her to a doctor.

  Nick pulled his baggy sweatpants and a pair of socks on her. Her pale gray-blue eyes were still dull with pain and shock, but she looked a little better.

  A powerful aftershock hit, jolting Cara out of her pain-induced stupor. Nick pulled her into the kitchen doorway and wrapped his right arm around her waist. He cradled her head with his left hand, and she leaned into his shoulder, letting him comfort her. Silent tears filled her eyes and spilled over, and he held her long after the trembling in the earth stopped, telling her without words that he cared.

  He was the only person in this world who did.

  <>

  Already irritated from all the detours and delays in getting home, Lance tried over and over again to call Sally at Cara’s estate in California. The recording kept coming on, saying all circuits were busy. Damn earthquake was a nuisance.

  He turned on the television. Amazing that they hadn’t lost power in this part of town. In the downtown area, all the traffic lights were out and the buildings dark.

  Where was Cara? She didn’t go to California, so she must be around here somewhere. With any luck, she was on Vashon Island. Dozens of people were dead there. “Tell me this is my lucky day,” he said to the television. “Tell me my wife is dead.”

  <>

  Nick settled Cara in his recliner in the living room, a pillow behind her back to cushion her injured shoulder. He put a cup of tea, two ibuprophen tablets, and a plate of sliced apples and cheese on the table beside the chair.

  She swallowed the pills and nibbled on a slice of apple while she watched him fiddle with his portable radio.

  He listened awhile and shook his head. “Those idiots think Seattle is the center of the universe.”

  “You mean it isn’t?”

  His eyes warmed when he smiled. “Smart-ass woman.”

  She almost laughed. She’d been called a lot of things, but never a ‘smart-ass woman.’ He said it more like a term of affection than an insult.

  It grew quiet except for the reporter on the radio giving an excited accounting of the problems in downtown Seattle. Cara tried to relax and let the pain pills work, but her head throbbed and her shoulder hurt with every breath. The gash on her leg must be deep, because pain radiated up to her hip and down to her foot. Tears welled up in her eyes, but she blinked them back and made an effort to stay calm. She’d get through this. She had to get through this or Lance would get what he wanted—her grandfather’s entire estate.

  Putting her trust in the wrong man had nearly ended her life, and Nick had given it back to her. She’d never be able to thank him enough for what he’d done. If not for him, she’d still be buried in the rubble of that cabin, dying a slow, agonizing death.

  She glanced at Nick, a rugged man with wavy hair and dark chocolate eyes. He looked like he’d had a hard life. His nose was crooked, like it had been broken, and he had an ugly scar over his right eye that replaced part of his eyebrow. In spite of the way he looked, there was a gentleness about him. He’d taken care of her as though she were someone he cared about, and she was immensely grateful. If he’d known who she was, would he have undressed her and washed her and put warm clothes on her? Would he have treated Cara Andrews, the heiress, with as much compassion?

  People who knew who she was treated her differently, as if her wealth made her less than human. Tabloid reporters had made her out to be some kind of freak, especially when her mother died and Cara inherited the Andrews estate, but having money didn’t make her any less human.

  Poor little rich girl the tabloids used to call her. If only they knew how poor she really was. She had few real friends, no living family, and a husband who would do anything to get his hands on her money. Just days ago she thought he loved her. Was she so starved for affection that she didn’t see the obvious? The family she craved was just a wishful fantasy, a dream that would never come true. After Lance’s betrayal, how could she ever trust any man again?

  She had to end her marriage before something else happened to her. Maybe Nick could help. He didn’t have to know who she was. “Nick, do you know a good attorney in Gig Harbor? I need someone smart and strong, someone who isn’t easily intimidated.”

  He raised his eyebrows. “Divorce?”

  “Yes, and it’ll be a messy one.”

  “How long have you been married?”

  “Four months. I overheard him planning to have me committed to an institution so he and his ‘honey’ could steal my money. That’s why I left.”

  Nick wondered how much money it would take for a man to have his wife committed. Ten thousand? A hundred thousand? A million? Ten million? She didn’t look rich, but then he’d never known any rich people.

  “Yeah, I know someone. My ex-brother-in-law. He’s a real shark in court.” At one time, Gerry Merlino had been a good friend, but that changed when he represented Lisa in the divorce. Now he and Gerry didn’t speak, didn’t socialize, didn’t have any contact at all. Yet, Gerry was the best attorney in town, and if Max needed the best, he’d hook her up with Gerry.

  She stared into her tea. “I don’t know what my husband had been giving me, but I’ve been sleeping most of the time since we moved to Seattle. If I hadn’t poured out the tea he made me one night, I wouldn’t have known what he was up to.”

  Nick waved his hand toward her cup. “Oh, hey. I promise, there’s nothing hokey about that tea.”

  “I know.” She looked up. “I know it’s an imposition, but may I stay here for a few days? As soon as I can, I’ll dig my purse out of the house. I have some money. I can pay—”

  He waved the thought away. “Keep your money.” He’d never ask someone for money under these circumstances. “I didn’t help you for money. I would have done it for anybody.”

  She closed her eyes and a single tear traced a path down her cheek. “Oh, God, I hurt.”

  Her shock was wearing off. Nick jumped up. “Max, I need to go find help.”

  Her eyes opened wide in fear. “No, please don’t leave me here alone.”

  He squatted down beside the chair and gently rubbed her arm, soothing her like a scared child. “Okay. It’s okay. I won’t leave you.”

  While Max rested, Nick fiddled with the radio until he found the local emergency station. The news wasn’t good. There were widespread power outages, ten people dead so far in Gig Harbor, and many more injured, and roads and bridges were badly damaged. “That’s what I was afraid of. I doubt we can get anywhere without a boat.” He checked the phone again, knowing it would probably be out for days. “I wish I had a cell phone.” There were enough cell sites a
round that if one was out, he might get a signal from another one.

  “There’s a phone in my purse. I left it in the kitchen.” She closed her eyes and breathed deeply as if trying to hold off the pain.

  Nick took her cup to the kitchen. “I think that corner of the cabin may still be intact.”

  He caught the look of deep pain in her eyes. Aside from that one time, she hadn’t cried, but if he knew anything about women, there were tears in there somewhere. Plenty of them. “You’re one gutsy lady. Any other woman I know would be crying her eyes out.”

  “My guardians said crying was a sign of emotional weakness, that if I cried I’d end up in a mental institution like my mother.”

  “Now that’s just about the dumbest thing I ever heard. If that was true, every other woman I know would be locked up, especially at that time of the month.” That coaxed a little smile from her.

  He waited a few minutes before saying, “Look, Max, I need to go down and look for your purse. We need the phone to call for help. I know I said I wouldn’t leave you, but it’s just for a few minutes, okay?”

  “Yes, okay, but be careful. If it’s too dangerous, leave it there.”

  She was worried about him? “Yeah, I’ll be careful. Give me twenty, thirty minutes before you panic.”

  As he walked down toward Mrs. Martin’s cabin, a voice from the top of the hill called, “Hey, Nicky. You okay?”

  Nick looked up at Tony. “Yeah. Anybody hurt? Is the house all right?”

  Tony galloped down the stairs. “Cracks here and there, two broken windows, broken dishes, Ma’s favorite vase, that kinda stuff, but nothing major. Ma’s fussing over the dog. Spooked the poor mutt. She sent me down to check on you.”

  “I’m glad you’re here. You can help me with something.” The two men walked down the beach, and Nick pointed to the collapsed cabin on the side of the hill. “I pulled a woman out of that mess after the earthquake. She’s hurt pretty bad, needs a doctor, but the phone is out and she can’t walk up to the road.”